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CHICAGO - With its acquisition of one of the three largest local CPA firms in the market, American Express Tax & Business Services is lunging closer to its goal of $500 million in revenue by the year 2000.
Capping eight months of widely followed negotiations, Checkers Simon & Rosner announced on March 18 that its $17 million advisory, tax and business and technology divisions would now be known as the Chicago Metro Area office of AmEx.
The Chicago firm will continue to operate its $6 million attest division as an independent accounting firm but the 28 partners will join AmEx as managing directors.
In another sizable acquisition, AmEx confirmed that it was close to signing Provident Financial Management, a $15 million Los Angeles firm specializing in business management services.
AmEx's other new deals include Friedman and Fuller of Rockville, Md.; Curtis, Bailey, Exelby & Sposito of Ann Arbor, Mich.; and Young, Craig + Co. of Los Angeles.
The deals give AmEx annualized revenues of $109 million and propels the firm into 11th place on the Accounting Today ranking of the Top 100 Tax and Accounting Firms. In Chicago, Checkers Simon's withdrawal leaves the field to Altschuler, Melvoin & Glasser, at $49 million in revenue; Friedman, Eisenstein, Raemer & Schwartz, at $42 million; and Thomas Havey & Co., at $22 million.
The Checkers Simon deal culminates nearly a year of negotiations involving Jerry Harris, the firm's managing partner; Robert C. Basten, AmEx president and chief executive officer; and Jeff Yabuki, vice president of mergers and acquisitions at AmEx.
The two sides first talked last summer in Minneapolis and...